Stuff - birthday stuff, house stuff, stuffy noses

It's been a busy week. Yesterday was my husband's birthday. I gave him a new kitchen floor, which I started on Monday (and yes, the tile for the bathroom counters are still sitting in the boxes in the back of my van - everafter known as "the staging area"). He wants an old, antique look to the kitchen. A place where he can display all of his old advertisements and coke collectibles, so when I found the black and white tile at such a price, it was HAPPY BIRTHDAY DOUG! I spent two back-breaking days sliding around on my butt and hunched over in such a way that almost ensured I'd never stand straight again. But it is done, it looks lovely even though black and white is not my favorite choice for flooring, and he's happy. Of course, it makes the rest of the kitchen world look real bad, but it's a start.
This past weekend brought illness in the form of sore throats and fevers. First, to Emily and on Sunday Leirin followed the path of contagion to her very own sick. Emily was able to go back to school yesterday and today is Leirin's first day back. This morning, after a really good day yesterday, Em woke up with a really weird sounding cough. Sounds like she has swallowed a goose and I'm not sure either of us are ready for another round with something different. I hope it passes. And fast.
So far it seems the only fast thing about it is how it spreads. People at work are being taken down left and right, kids are out of school (or in school doing their part to propagate the spread while ensuring they won't be challenged by the district officials for truancy) while the rest of us sit back and wait to be hit with it.
When my kids are sick I'd love to just keep them home. Give them a week or so to let things go completely by and give them time to regain their strength but I find myself thinking "we're getting mighty close to pushing the limit of days out...you have to be better by tomorrow." It's such a hard thing for me to do knowing that still they are running on near depleted energy supplies after being sick. They are not better.
I looked at the girls this morning, definitely better than they have been, but their eyes are so tired and they sigh heavily from the effort of just getting dressed, and I just want to send them back to bed so they can have the rest their eyes plead for. But instead I write a note asking to be called if they just can't make it through the day, knowing that probably won't happen, and I send them on their way. I hate compliance.

Cotton Candy Skies

The sun was rising just before we left for school this morning - great big cotton candy swirls of fluffy clouds with the sun filtering through cast a warm glow across the horizon. Beautiful way to start the day. Now, an hour later, the sun is up and the pretty colors of first light have faded to shades of white and baby blue. It's the trees now that brighten the morning with their flaming red and gold leaves. At our old house we had mostly pines so colorful displays were limited, but here in our new front yard the trees provide a tantalizing burlesque as winter grows near. These are the best days. They move me to make things comfortable and cozy.
That's the only excuse I can make to explain why, when I went to buy glazing and paint for the loose window panes, I managed to find marble and granite to redo the bathroom counter tops. I'm not doing the bathrooms now, but somehow here I am making plans to do the bathrooms now. I've not glazed a single window but I did paint the front door and the new weather stripping goes on today. At least some moves I'm making are in the right direction. Before the harsh winds of winter settle in, I will have missing glass replaced in the windows, and in between I'll lay a few tiles, throw on some paint and wallpaper, and make the bathrooms an inviting and cozy haven of beautiful, relaxing sights.
I spent yesterday working on computers. Jake's now sports a new graphics card that makes even our old games look so "wow!" and I salvaged bits and parts from three broken systems to build Emily an impressive Frankenstein that makes everyone in the house jealous. 2.0ghz, 512mb DDR RAM and a whopping 120gb harddrive. Everybody wants it and if it had Jake's new graphics card it would definitely be The Bomb.
Today is school and a quick run to the vet with Luna. She's losing weight for some reason and at only seven or eight pounds to start, we can't wait long to see what's going to happen. At some point I hope to glaze at least one of those windows. Old Man Winter is coming down the road and windows with no glass let in a heck of a draft.

The dreaded headache hangover

I woke up to the sounds of a morning thunderstorm. Real thunder - the kind that scares our big, goofy, sweet dog, Gimli and has him pawing at the front door begging to be locked in the indoor crate where it is safe. Silly dog. It was nearly 9:30 and I'm not sure I would have awakened then had it not been for the sound of the thunder because of the migraine I've had since Friday night. At least I'm guessing it's a migraine. It's very similar and very different from any I've ever had before.
Friday night I couldn't see. Well, I could see but it was like looking at an overexposed picture, or looking directly at the sun. I couldn't focus and it was all just too bright. I went to bed because even sitting up in a dark room was kind of like looking through those funky night-vision binoculars or something. The headache woke me up about 3am. There was pain. Lots of pain that made me want to curl up on the floor in some dark corner and cry (or find someone to volunteer to cut my head off and be done with it.) I managed to grab snatches of sleep off and on from 5 - 6 yesterday morning but the headache wasn't going to give any ground.
We met the family for lunch yesterday afternoon because it was Leirin's birthday and I managed to muddle through it ok; though I did get many more "poor thing" and "go home and rest" than Leirin got Happy Birthdays. I really hated that I kept her birthday celebration from being as fun as they usually turn out to be. I came straight home and hit the couch, where I stayed until I woke up somewhere around 8:00. Back to bed by 11:00 and everybody in the house, even Jake, beat me awake this morning. That never happens.
Now I feel like I have a hangover. I always have migraine hangovers and I hate them almost as bad as the mirgaines themselves. The muscles in my neck are so tense from working hard to hold my head as still as possible, even when I sleep, that it's difficult for me to move. Still, if I bend over to get something, that mean old headache mafia dude that seems to be following me around this weekend, leans over and stabs me in the right side of my head with an icepick so I'm not sure the headache is gone at all. At the moment though, I don't feel like I'm going to be sick and that is a blessing of the highest kind. My body is so tense all over I'd give anything for a deep muscle massage.